Boston Ended Its Flock Pilot: What the City Report Says About Data Sharing

According to the city's 2025 Surveillance Technology Report, the pilot ran 156 days with approximately 45 cameras, as reported by WBUR and Ars Technica. Access was meant to be limited to trained BPD personnel.

The report says BPD learned within three days that other agencies could access plate and vehicle data through a nationwide lookup feature, and had it disabled. The report does not identify which agencies searched Boston's data or how many drivers were affected, according to Ars Technica and WBUR.

WBUR reported that Flock did not respond to its request for comment.

WBUR reports that BPD received 77 requests from other agencies for Boston's Flock data over the five months following the fix. Those requests came from federal agencies and from Massachusetts and Maine police departments, according to WBUR.

Mayor Michelle Wu said on GBH News, "We have actually abandoned Flock," as reported by Ars Technica. Ars Technica and GovTech report that BPD ran a Motorola trial starting February 2026 and an Axon trial starting June 2026.

The report says the city now requires vendors to agree not to share plate reader data and to delete recordings after 30 days unless police request retention. Mayor Wu said any use of license plate reader technology needs a publicly approved policy.

The ACLU says at least 25 Massachusetts communities have cancelled Flock contracts, according to WBUR. The Boston case shows why a contract provision that says sharing is "off" is not the same as being able to verify it — and why audit logs and public surveillance reports matter.

If your community uses Flock, you may be able to request audit logs and data-sharing records through a public records request. See our guide on how to FOIA your plate scan records. If you spot a camera in your area, you can report it to the map.

The public record does not yet show which agencies accessed Boston's data during the initial exposure window, how many searches were conducted, or what Flock's account of the error is. Flock did not respond to WBUR's request for comment.